Regret !

A thought occurred to me. The only way to prevent or at the very least reduce Regret, would e to figure out what one is likely to regret. And then do something about it. This led me down the meandering path that the Internet so beautifully provides. Here are a few of the amazing insights and advice.

"Regret doesn't remind us we did badly. It reminds us we can do better."

"
Why We Have Regret
BY LEO BABAUTA

We’ve all heard the phrase, “No regrets!”, usually uttered when about to do something a little unwise perhaps.

And yet, as alluring as the “Living Without Regrets” philosophy sounds, it’s not always so easy.
We regret missed opportunities.
We regret things that made us feel dumb.
We regret not telling someone we loved them more before they died.
We regret not spending our time more wisely, accomplishing more.
We regret procrastinating, not forming better habits, eating too many sweets, not writing the novel we always wanted to write, not reading all the books we planned to read, not mastering Russian or chess or the ninja arts.
We regret getting into bad relationships, or making mistakes in a past relationship.

Yes, we regret things, and sometimes it can be consuming.

...
"
https://zenhabits.net/regret/

5 Key Things We've Learned About Regret
... and why you should be leery of anyone who says they have none.
Todd B. Kashdan Ph.D.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/curious/201008/5-key-things-weve-learned-about-regret

 
Nothing to Regret - small bad habits cause lifelong regrets
Iman Aghay
"9 out of 10 people regret something big in their lives. Many of these regrets are caused by seemingly insignificant bad habits. In this talk you will hear what causes bad habits and how these bad habits cause our lifelong regrets. You will also hear how to live a regret free life by identifying these bad habits and purging them one by one."

Don't regret regret
Kathryn Schulz
We're taught to try to live life without regret. But why? Using her own tattoo as an example, Kathryn Schulz makes a powerful and moving case for embracing our regrets.
"Regret doesn't remind us we did badly. It reminds us we can do better."

The Antidote to Regret
Kimberly Rich

Kimberly reveals that regret, while universal, is actually avoidable. In this dynamic and surprising talk, she shares 3 ways that individuals can prevent regret and lead fulfilling lives.

Risk Intelligence

We've been doing a fair amount of work on developing algorithms for the equity markets and hence a subject that I happily discuss a lot. One of the things that stood out to me was that many of the people I discuss the same with, and even those in the financial fields are unable to appreciate "Risk" and its implication to the possible end results.

It has also seemed to me that many of the financial crisis were triggered by this lack of appreciation. I'm also learning Poker, one of the items on my bucket list. And I found that the understanding of Risk in a game of chance was much higher than in what's supposedly, "Investment".

Here are a few videos that not only gave me a much better insight on a new term I learnt "Risk Intelligence", but also showed why I should not have been surprised that most people don't understand Risk.


What Can We Learn From Expert Gamblers?
Dylan Evans at TEDxWestlake

 

And this excellent article in Forbes.

How Risk-Intelligent Are You?

Try this very simple test. If I offered you the choice between the following two bets, which would you take?

Bet 1; toss a coin. Heads, you win $75. Tails, you lose $50.

Bet 2: roll a dice. A six, you win $750. A 1,2,3,4 or 5, you lose $100.

Good or bad bet? You decide.

So which would you choose? Or would you prefer not to take either?

If you chose the coin toss, or declined to play at all, then you are not risk-intelligent at all.

If you chose the dice roll with some internal conflict, or after making a calculation, you are risk-intelligent.

If you chose the dice roll instantly, intuitively with no internal conflict or conscious calculation, then you are very risk-intelligent.

Let me explain the logic. And then, I will explain what this has to do with business.

These three possibilities have been set up so that their mathematical attractiveness is inversely proportional to their psychological attractiveness. Bet 1 has an expected value of $12.50; put another way, if you played it repeatedly you would on average win $12.50. Bet 2 has an expected value of $41.67 - more than three times as attractive. Not playing, of course, has an expected value of zero.

That's the mathematics, but the psychology is quite a different matter. When making these sorts of choices, our default mode is not to calculate the gains and losses mathematically, but to weigh them psychologically. The coin toss is unappealing psychologically because the pain of losing $100 weighs more than the pleasure  of winning $150 (in studies, experimenters have found they needed to offer a gain of $250 to get even a majority of people to accept the bet). The dice roll is even less attractive psychologically - the potential loss is larger, and more likely.

So, if you declined to play or chose the coin toss, you allowed your psychological bias to lead you away from the most profitable option.

If you were like most people who chose the dice roll, you had to overcome a conflict between basic psychology, which wanted you to avoid loss, and intelligent risk assessment. Choosing the mathematically superior option probably felt uncomfortable  but once you had calculated the odds you overcame that discomfort. If this is you, then you are risk-intelligent.

Finally, you may be one of the small majority who chose the superior option with no psychological conflict and no need for a calculation. If this is you, then you are extremely risk-intelligent.

What does this have to do with business? Everything. Your work offers you a constant stream of bets, although they are usually called "investment opportunities." They may be big like developing a new product, or medium-sized like trying to win a significant new customer, or as small as spending a couple of hours reorganising the way you do some particular thing in order to save 10 minutes  day. They all offer different levels of risk and return. The danger is that our natural loss aversion either prevents us from taking any of these opportunities because of the risk of loss, or limits our attention to those which offer reasonable chances of success, like the coin toss. The problem is that there may be better opportunities out there, but they look more like a dice roll and so we avoid them.

What would your business be if you became more risk-intelligent?

https://www.forbes.com/sites/alastairdryburgh/2018/01/30/how-risk-intelligent-are-you/#58090e826622


And here's my favorite on how to Manage Risk.
Three Simple, Fun and Effective Tools to Help Manage Risk
Will Gadd

 

And finally the most amazing yet super simple explanation on Risk Illiteracy.

Risk literacy

Gerd Gigerenzer

And if you enjoyed Gerd Gigerenzer, here's another that's equally interesting.
How do smart people make smart decisions?
Gerd Gigerenzer

The History of Everything - in 18 minutes

As you know by now, I'm a fan of the Crash Course. Learning or doing a lot in a short span of time. And so the I saw that I could learn "The History of Everything" in 18 minutes, I was sold.

Yes! Covering 13.8 billion years in 18 minutes. Have a look.

And after learning Big History, I was hooked. And had a look at the "Big History Project". And I was filled with regret. Regret that I had no clue that this project existed. And am hooked and will be spending a lot of time learning history. A subject that was never a favorite, but am beginning to like.

https://www.bighistoryproject.com/home

Wall Street: Mathematics or Rigged or Science ?

We've been working on creating algorithms for the money markets. And I found this 2015 interview with Jim Simons, extremely interesting and currently relevant. Check it out.

"Jim Simons was a mathematician and cryptographer who realized: the complex math he used to break codes could help explain patterns in the world of finance. Billions later, he’s working to support the next generation of math teachers and scholars. TED’s Chris Anderson sits down with Simons to talk about his extraordinary life in numbers."

The mathematician who cracked Wall Street
Jim Simons

And then there's Michael Lewis in a 2014 interview during the release of his book "Flash Boys", where he argues that the markets are rigged against you.

Michael Lewis: Nobody Understands the Stock Market

And you cannot study or discuss Trading and Wall Street and not think about gambling.

This is a much longer video, but worth it if you have the time. If you are interested in gambling, this might be a gamble worth taking.

How Science is Taking the Luck out of Gambling
with Adam Kucharski

A bold idea to replace politicians

In recent times politics and politicians has become toxic. No matter what political persuasion you belong to, conservative, liberal, centrist or independent, the only aspect that everyone agrees on is that the views of the others is extreme and that collaboration and civility in politics is non existent.

Hence this TED talk was refreshing. And gives you Hope, even if for a brief fleeting moment before coming back to reality.

"César Hidalgo has a radical suggestion for fixing our broken political system: automate it! In this provocative talk, he outlines a bold idea to bypass politicians by empowering citizens to create personalized AI representatives that participate directly in democratic decisions. Explore a new way to make collective decisions and expand your understanding of democracy."

A bold idea to replace politicians.
César Hidalgo

 

This led to yet another interesting idea on the subject.

"If you think democracy is broken, here's an idea: let's replace politicians with randomly selected people. Author and activist Brett Hennig presents a compelling case for sortition democracy, or random selection of government officials -- a system with roots in ancient Athens that taps into the wisdom of the crowd and entrusts ordinary people with making balanced decisions for the greater good of everyone. Sound crazy? Learn more about how it could work to create a world free of partisan politics."

What if we replaced politicians with randomly selected people?
Brett Hennig

And it seems like there are literally 100's of ideas and thoughts on the subject. And here's my final pick.

"Harvard Professor Lawrence Lessig makes the case that our democracy has become corrupt with money, leading to inequality that means only 0.02% of the United States population actually determines who's in power. Lessig says that this fundamental breakdown of the democratic system must be fixed before we will ever be able to address major challenges like climate change, social security, and student debt. This is not the most important problem, it's just the first problem.

Lawrence Lessig is the Roy L. Furman Professor of Law and Leadership at Harvard Law School, former director of the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University, and founder of Rootstrikers, a network of activists leading the fight against government corruption. He has authored numerous books, including Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Our Congress—and a Plan to Stop It, Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace, Free Culture, and Remix."

Our democracy no longer represents the people. Here's how we fix it.
Larry Lessig

It seems like in the next 5 decades, we might actually have working alternates to the current broken system.